Is Your Website Over Four Years Old?

Google May Not Rank It.

If Google searches are important to you and your website is over four years old, you may be in trouble. In April, Google announced that it is shifting its ranking metrics to favor websites that are optimized for mobile use. If your website was built over four years ago, it may not be optimized for mobile use because mobile devices weren’t at the forefront of web thought.

Ah, you say. My site can be seen and used by mobile devices.

That’s fine, but while your site might show up on a mobile device, it still may not be optimized for mobile usage.

Google’s decision has huge implications for every business – not just for retail or consumer-oriented businesses. For B2B, the new metrics can completely change your ranking by Google’s search engine.

If you were enjoying a ranking of #1, #2, or #3 prior to this announcement, through careful search engine optimization, you may be shoved well away from the first page no matter how effective your SEO – if your site is not also optimized for mobile usage.

If you have to revamp your website to be “found” by Google, you may be wondering why Google is making this shift. The answer reflects today’s reality: over 80% of Internet users around the world own a smartphone and approximately 47% use tablets. If those statistics don’t tell the tale, roughly three hours per day of Internet time is spent on mobile devices.

So what does this mean for you and your site? Of course you’ll still have to make sure you aren’t using flash (which Google can’t see behind) and that you are keeping your content fresh through blogs and updates, but none of that matters if you don’t first pass the threshold test of whether your site isn’t optimized for mobile use.

If you’re unsure whether your site meets Google’s optimization standards, give us a call at 713-623-6086. We can tell you whether you need to revamp so that once again you can be found.